The math behind Silicon Valley's  millionaire factory

Equity grants at SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI have turned into life-changing sums for engineers, with some grants now valued at over $50 million. The windfalls depend on vesting, dilution, and lockups, but highlight the wealth created by Silicon Valley's frontier tech companies.

New Levels.fyi analyses show how equity grants at frontier tech companies have turned into life-changing sums. A SpaceX https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-ipo-wild-bet-physical-future-ai-orbital-data-centers-2026-5 Software Engineer II offer from August 2022 included a $155,000 salary and a $365,000 equity grant that vested over five years. At SpaceX's IPO https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-ipo-10-largest-public-offerings-ranked-by-proceeds-2026-6 valuation, that grant is estimated to be worth more than $4 million, assuming it was held. At Anthropic https://www.businessinsider.com/anthropic-rewriting-startup-pay-levels-2025-9 , engineers who joined in 2023 may now be sitting on equity worth tens of millions of dollars after the AI company's valuation surge. OpenAI https://www.businessinsider.com/openai-1-million-pay-packages-tech-memo-2025-8 shows a similar pattern, with some 2022 and 2023 equity grants to engineers now valued at over $50 million. These are not guaranteed windfalls: variables such as vesting, dilution, and lockups mean employees may end up with less. And don't forget those huge tax bills https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-employees-sell-stock-avoid-capital-gains-tax-spacex-ipos-2026-6 . Still, these estimates give a real taste of the wealth that Silicon Valley has created — and spread among workers https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-version-capitalism-works-equity-ipos-tax-2026-6 . Sign up for BI's Tech Memo newsletter here https://www.businessinsider.com/subscription/newsletter/tech-memo . Reach out to me via email at abarr@businessinsider.com mailto:abarr@businessinsider.com .